From CMX to FCPX

I started my professional editing career in 1986 as a very jr. post editor at WXIA in Atlanta. (I had done 5 years in television in the Army before that) I began with the CMX 3600 and through freelance gigs and a year at CNN post, I progressed through GVG, Axial, ACE, Sony, Quantel Harry and maybe others. I remember shaking my head at NAB in 1991 when NewTek introduced the Toaster as an edit suite replacement.! HOW COULD THEY POSSIBLY REPLACE A $750,000 EDIT SUITE WITH THAT? IT'S NOT PROFESSIONAL!l

So now after the Immix Video Cube, Avid Symphony, Media 100, Premiere Pro, and 6 yr. love affair with FCP, my mind was totally changed. I, like everyone else was waiting with baited breath to see what 64 bit upgrade Apple would bring forth.

I have visited this forum daily, watching the grenades being lobbed back and forth, but I could not afford $300 just to try it out. When the trial came out, I downloaded it immediately, but then waited a couple of weeks to install it until the right project came along.

So now, after editing 2 small projects, (a 30 second web spot, and a church music video) I would have to say that I have never been as excited about an NLE as I am about this one! Only the Video Cube came close. It is certainly not ready for a lot of the higher end applications, but if the ability to hook up an AJA, BMD or Matrox IO works, and it has a workable multicam, it will become my NLE of choice. I have moved to a small city in East Texas to do church work, so I am far away from the hallowed grounds of Broadcast TV, but I am still a professional editor, and I for one, believe FCPX has a lot of potential.

BUT...... Saturday morning, my editor savvy 16 year daughter is in my office to watch one of my projects. She takes one look at my monitor, and says. "That looks like imovie".... Aghhhhh!

Don, I remember the Toaster...haha. I was on Amiga in the early 90s. Applied Magic hat a capture card out that was challenging the Toaster. I helped Microsoft´s Agency with their Win95 launch, because nobody could make an insert-edit in a BetacmSP tape within hours for little money. I could and the Ad (the one with Rolling Stone´s "Start me up" as soundtrack) was aired in time. Bill Gates never heard of any problems....nice.

FCP to me wasn´t a good NLE, it just was able to do a lot, but nothing really good. And it ran on Macs, which is a big feature in itself. I liked using it, but it frustrated me, knowing how NLEs years before had way better skillsets built in.

Anyway, many who have been through several NLEs and have seen the good ones, not only FCP, apparently like FCPX, because they find features that they have almost forgotten. I can totally repeat your experience. A few extrenal connections are missing, but the NLE itself is a rockstar.